Seattle dominates the Pats 6-1 to tie series up at 2

Seattle was not about to go quietly, in fact Wednesday night the Thunderbirds stormed back very loudly.

An exciting 3-2 win by the Pats on Tuesday night is all but a memory after the Thunderbirds dominate performance at home on Wednesday.

The game was almost all Seattle, though it didn’t start that way.

It was actually the Pats that got on the board first with Dawson Leedahl making an improbable pass from his knees to find Sam Steel in front of the net. The Pats standout forward made no mistake, burying it behind Carl Stankowski to give the Pats the early lead.

But as was often the case in this series, it didn’t take long for Seattle to come storming back and tie things up. About three minutes later Ryan Gropp found his way past Pats goalie Tyler Brown on the power play to tie things up at one.

Head coach John Paddock said things started to unravel for them from there.

“After the weak holding call on Schioler, they scored the powerplay goal and we seemed to stop for whatever reason,” Paddock said.

The Seattle onslaught continued.

Nineteen seconds later Sami Moilanen scored on a misplayed puck behind the Pats night and three minutes after that Nolan Volcan scored.

In a span of three minutes and 22 seconds, the Pats were behind 3-1 heading into intermission.

Seattle’s dominance continued through the second period with three more goals scored on the Pats and Brown courtesy of Jarret Tyszka, Alexander True and Keegan Kolesar, putting Regina in the nearly impossible position of being down by five goals heading into the second intermission.

The third period started with goaltender Jordan Hollett in net, who did an admirable job filling in for Brown and guided the Pats through another 12 shots and several powerplays. He held the line for the Pats in net, but the offence wasn’t able to get anything going sealing the final at 6-1.

It’s a game the Pats will want to put behind them quickly as they prep for game 5 Friday night, which remains in Seattle.

“It’s not very nice when you read in the paper online you lost 6-1, but the result is the same as 2-1,” Paddock said, adding he’s confident the team will bounce back like they have all season from big wins and, at times, big losses.

“It’s not the first adversity we faced this playoffs,” added Steel. “I don’t think there’s any momentum in playoffs so we’ll come with a fresh start on Friday and we’re going to bring our best game.”

Seattle’s win ties the series up at two games apiece and ensures that a game six will be played in Regina on Friday night.

Tickets go on sale Thursday at noon.